(S’)écrire l’exil à Montréal ou comment s’enraciner dans un espace autre

Abstract

Montreal, a quintessentially rhizomatic city, has always allowed, even fostered exile. As a space of exile opening towards
the Other, it has become one of the favourite places of migrancy. Writers, whether temporary or permanent adoptees, bear witness
to an individual and collective memory. Montreal is an undeniable landmark for identity proliferation; it is, par excellence, a conducive space for writing, an existential territory where the consciousness of the writing subject is inscribed.
We will explore in what manner (with admiration and/or passion? with fear and/or interest?) several famous writers position themselves in this Montreal scene of multiple identity confrontations: Régine Robin, Sergio Kokis, Marco Micone, Naïm Kattan, Kim Thúy, mentioned intermittently, with Dany Laferrière and the Romanian Felicia Mihali receiving more in-depth analysis, along with their preferred places in the framework of geocriticism. Both contemplate how to appropriate a city and a culture laden with history, how to settle into a space and make it hospitable, but above all, they demonstrate how this welcoming land is profoundly fertile for
literary creation. We will address the issue of the immigrant in the process of acculturation who must tame an urban space fraught
with provocations, vulnerabilities, and fragmentations, and of the writer who finds the expression of their identity configurations in
anamorphoses there.